Text 2771) Sāryabhauma Bhattīācārya Offers Prasāda to the Lord
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mode of goodness. In the material world, the three modes are goodness, passion and ignorance, and all of these are simply different gradations of contamination. Unless a  brāhmaṇa  transcends such contamination and approaches the platform of unalloyed devotional service, he cannot be accepted as a Vaiṣṇava. An impersonalist may be aware of the impersonal Brahman feature of the Absolute Truth, but his activities are on the impersonal platform. Sometimes he imagines a form of the Lord ( saguṇa-upāsanā ), but such an attempt is never successful in helping one attain complete realization. The impersonalist may consider himself a  brāhmaṇa  and may be situated in the mode of goodness, but nonetheless he is conditioned by one of the modes of material nature. This means that he is not yet liberated, for liberation cannot be attained unless one is completely free from the modes. In any case, the Māyāvāda philosophy keeps one conditioned. If one becomes a Vaiṣṇava through proper initiation, he automatically becomes a  brāhmaṇa . There is no doubt about it. The  Garuda Purāna  confirms this:
brāhmaṇānāṁ sahasrebhyaḥ satra-yājī viśiṣyate satra-yāji-sahasrebhyaḥ sarva-vedānta-pāragaḥ sarva-vedānta-vit-koṭyā viṣṇu-bhakto viśiṣyate
“Out of many thousands of  brāhmaṇas , one may become qualified to perform  yajña . Out of many thousands of such qualified  brāhmaṇas , one may be fully aware of the Vedānta philosophy. Out of many millions of learned Vedānta scholars, there may be one  viṣṇu-bhakta , or devotee of Lord Viṣṇu. It is he who is most exalted.”
Unless one is a fully qualified  brāhmaṇa , he cannot advance in the spiritual science. A real  brāhmaṇa  is never envious of Vaiṣṇavas. If he is, he is considered an imperfect neophyte. Impersonalist  brāhmaṇas  are always opposed to Vaiṣṇava principles. They are envious of Vaiṣṇavas because they do not know the goal of life.  Na te viduḥ svārtha-gatiṁ hi viṣṇum . However, when a  brāhmaṇa  becomes a Vaiṣṇava, there is no duality. If a  brāhmaṇa  does not become a Vaiṣṇava, he certainly falls down from the  brāhmaṇa  platform. This is confirmed by  Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam  (11.5.3):  na bhajanty avajānanti sthānād bhraṣṭāḥ patanty adhaḥ .
We can actually see that in this age of Kali many so-called  brāhmaṇas  are envious of Vaiṣṇavas. The Kali-contaminated  brāhmaṇas  consider Deity worship to be imaginative:  arcye viṣṇau śilā-dhīr guruṣu nara-matir vaiṣṇave jāti-buddhiḥ . Such a contaminated  brāhmaṇa  may superficially imagine a form of the Lord, but actually he considers the Deity in the temple to be made of stone or wood. Similarly, such a contaminated  brāhmaṇa  considers the  guru  to be an ordinary human being, and he objects when a Vaiṣṇava is created by the Kṛṣṇa conscious-